


Count Bezukhov's Son

by Five



Category: Voyná i mir | War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
Genre: First Meetings, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-12-01 00:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11474910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Five/pseuds/Five
Summary: Fifteen year old Pierre Kirillovich visits Count Kiril Bezukhov's home for Christmas Eve after receiving a letter requesting his presence.





	Count Bezukhov's Son

The Moscow house of Count Kiril Bezukhov was cleaned and lit brightly for the first Christmas Eve of the new century. The paint was still fresh from earlier in the season, and the pale yellow house veiled by the fresh falling snow. The young Pierre Kirillovich sat in a carriage, wrapped in a new fur cloak that was two times too big for him. It had been a birthday gift, ordered from his father through a certain famous Parisian furrier who had neither met Pierre nor his father. All the count had known was that the coat would be well made and that it was his son’s birthday. It arrived for Pierre two days late with no note and he had been wearing it nearly a year since without growing into it. He sat quietly in the carriage, anxious and biting the inside of his cheek hard enough that the slightest bump of the carriage could draw blood. He scanned the letter again over his spectacles and folded it into the pocket of his coat. It delivered him to the Moscow estate just in time, near exactly when he was expected from abroad. 

 

When Pierre entered the house, a footman announced him, simply as Pyotr Kirillovich, with no name after that. As he’d learned, he pushed his head down and swallowed his shame. 

“Pyotr!” Katerina Semyonovna and her two her blonde-tressed sisters floated towards him giggling.

“Please, call me Pierre. It’s good to see you, dear cousin Katerina.”

“Well if I’m to call you Pierre then you must call me Catiche.” She smiled condescendingly.

“Catiche, yes. Catiche, is my father here? He wrote to me and-” Pierre produced the letter, fumbling in his pockets, “and he asked to see me.” He blushed as he said the last part, pleased that his father had called him to visit, and embarrassed by the pride it filled him with.

“Oh Catiche,” said a sister of hers, with a fast thinking smile, “you didn't.”

Catiche quickly caught onto her sister’s point and smiled.

“I didn't!” She said before concealing a laugh behind her gloved hand. She even snorted a little.

“Didn’t- didn't- didn't what? What didn't she, didn't you, Catiche, what didn't you do?” Pierre began to stutter and lisp and trip on his words as he often did when made uncomfortable or nervous.

“Can I see your letter?” Asked the sister, not waiting for him to respond before taking it up from him.

“I'm not sure I follow. Can I have that back?” Pierre asked. “Excuse me, but that letter is mine. It’s, it’s from my father, from Count Bezukhov, he said he wanted to see me and I don't know where he...I'm sorry. Why are you…” He didn't finish his phrase before he realized with horror the implication Catiche had created. Amused by the sad confusion on his face, the Princesses Mamontov hid laughter behind their fans.

 

Pierre said nothing at all and took back his letter. The humiliation did not upset him, or at least not nearly as much as the disappointment. He put the letter back in his comically overlarge coat.

“Can I still…” Pierre felt tears beginning to choke him, drawing a deep breath before continuing, “I can’t get back to Switzerland until the weekend is over. I’ll stay out of sight if I need to, but can I still…”

“Ex-cuse me,” a voice came from behind Pierre, calm and pointed, “terribly sorry to interrupt this, ehm,  _ conversation _ . I’m looking for the Count’s son. Is that you? Are you Count Pyotr Bezukhov?”

“I’m, I’m the count’s son,” Pierre replied, pressing his lips closed.

“Prince Andrei Bolkonsky. You have your father’s eyes. I’m sorry again, I think, I’ve lost my way, I was supposed to be back to the count’s study soon. Could you walk me?”

“Perhaps you’d want one of us to walk you?” Asked the young and marriageable Princess Evgenia Semyonovna.

“If it’s no trouble, I’m sure Count Pyotr would like to see his father, and I’d like to become acquainted with him.” 

“Well, Pierre is not as well acquainted with the house as I-”

“Apologies, my wife will be worrying after me. Count Bezukhov?” Andrei said, extending a hand to Pierre, who looked around a bit before gladly taking it. The two walked down the gallery, down lines of portraits of ancestors that Pierre didn’t know the names of.

“My name isn't Count Bezukhov, you know.” Pierre confessed as he lead Andrei down the hall.

“I know. I've heard of you.”

“Why did you do that then?” Pierre said, “I can't be worth the embarrassment of that kind of mistake.”

“It was Katerina Semyonovna who was embarrassing herself.” 

“I don't understand.” Pierre said, struggling to keep with the quickness of Prince Andrei’s step. At fifteen, he was promised to grow more still, but as of yet he was not as tall as he should be. Prince Andrei walked quickly. It was clear enough to Pierre that he knew where he was going. Andrei pointed to a painting.

“That one looks like you. Who is it?”

“Somebody I'm not supposed to be related to.”

“Why do you speak of yourself like that? You're still Count Bezukhov’s son. He still wanted to see you. He's been looking for you all night.”

Pierre stopped and glanced back at the painting. “He has?”

“He has,” Prince Andrei repeated.

 

Pierre smiled, concealed behind his fur coat which he had forgotten to take off at the door and continued, faster now, down the hall. He meandered absentmindedly down past a large staircase before noticing Prince Andrei had stopped.

“This staircase, no?”

“Yes. You're right.” Pierre nodded and ran clumsily back.

“Have we met at all before?”

“I was at your sister’s name day party last year, yes,” Pierre smiled a little, almost apologetically.

“Ah, yes. I remember that now. You were shorter, and I believe you and count Kiril left before then end?”

“Yes, we felt we were imposing and, I apologize if I, if I,”

“It's no trouble. I remember my father telling me  _ Prince Andrei- _ he always calls me Prince Andrei, and he has since I was eight-  _ if you don't greet everyone at every seat… _ ”

“Then what?”

“I don't know. He wasn't very clear. It was no trouble for me not to get a chance to meet you- I'll admit I was a bit frightened trying to get to every guest in one night- though I'm glad I can do it now,” said Prince Andrei, stopping for Pierre to catch up to him, at the door to the study. “I take it you haven't met my father, then? He and the count are old friends, they're talking right now.”

Pierre confessed he hadn’t but that he had heard of the Old Prince’s service to the sovereign.

Prince Andrei put a hand on the door and looked back at Pierre. “You'll like him, then. He's like you- eccentric.” He turned the door handle.

“Wait.” Pierre said and fell back from the door. It didn't need to be said out loud. He wasn't ready. “I'm still wearing my overcoat,” thought Pierre, “it's too big on me, he'll think, maybe then, I'm trying play to his sympathies. And I like that Prince Andrei, I can think of one hundred things I could say that would embarrass the both of us. Not to imply that I'd have to speak at all…” he stood, nailed to the floor, with his body trembling and mind lit with anxiety. 

“Are you alright?” asked Prince Andrei.

“I'm fine,” Pierre assured him, wrapping his coat over his hands, “You said your wife was waiting for you. You're married? Young, aren't you?”

“Twenty two. And engaged, actually. But women like Evgenia Mamontov need absolutes.”

“Who is she?”

“Her name is Lise Meinen-” he said, then adding with a softening smile, “-will be Lise Bolkonskaya.”

“Will she like me?”

“She has always liked the people I've introduced to her, so long as I've believed they have been good.”

Pierre walked to the door and put a hand on top of Prince Bolkonsky’s on the doorknob. “And does that mean she will.”

“I'm sure of it.” 

Pierre steadied his hand and together they opened the door to the study.

 


End file.
